BUTLER TWP — The Butler Township commissioners voted Monday to change the municipality’s policy on retaining audio tapes of public meetings.

The tapes, which have been kept on file for two years, now will be destroyed immediately after commissioners approve the written meeting minutes.

This change is effective now.

Commissioners approve meeting minutes at each of the board’s regular meetings. Township manager Ed Kirkwood said that the township always has made the documents available for review even before the commissioners approve them.

The commissioners approved the change after Kirkwood said the move would reduce the amount of time staffers spend responding to requests for government records.

“Our staff is inundated constantly with Right-to-Know requests,” Kirkwood said.

He said the township receives four or five requests each week, and most come from businesses.

Kirkwood said the state’s Office of Open Records recommended the move.

Township solicitor Larry Lutz called the move a “two-edged sword,” but agreed that some requests are “inane.”

Commissioner Dave Zarnick said the change makes sense because the audio tapes of meetings lose their standing as official records after written minutes are adopted.

“We’re not trying to hide anything,” he said. “These tapes have no meaning or bearing once those minutes are in that book.”